Mass Effect Reborn Mod Jumps Into Homeworld 2

Share this:

At the end of Mass Effect 3, thousands of ships from all across known space come together to liberate Earth and smash the Reapers. Then a pretty cutscene plays, and we passively watch the ensuing cool space battle. But oh, what if you gathered and commanded the fleet, and they were following your strategy? What if the slog across the Milky Way were a bit more Homeworld-ian? Turns out I didn’t write those sentences as idle musings, that there is actually a purpose to this post.

See, that’s basically the idea behind Mass Effect Reborn, a Homeworld 2 mod where you get to control that Alliance fleet. The first version is out now, if you fancy giving it a bash.

Mass Effect Reborn is made by Phoenix Interactive, the folks also behind Homeworld 2’s Stargate Space Conflict mod. Though this is version 1.0, Phoenix consider it to be a “pre-beta” release and plan to follow it up with the actual full version at the end of the month. They’re looking to include more speech and dialogue, better AI, research trees, and other odds and ends.

It does cheekily use a few of Mass Effect’s models and textures, so don’t be entirely surprised if EA Foxes the mod. Here, have a gander:

It really depends on how they’re doing the classic versions. Is the HW2 classic release going to be included in the Homeworld 2 Remastered version? If it is, the mods get the benefit of compatibility (with classic HW2) and extra PR (from the Remastered version).

Gearbox says there’s two versions, there’s the remastered version with upped textures, sounds and stuff, and then there’s the classic classic version with no changes besides modern OS compatibility. Sounds like they’re doing it right.

I’ve always thought it was a shame that the Mass Effect universe is limited to the Mass Effect games. It has so much potential for rts, 4x, space trading and so many other types of games beyond just RPG-Lite Cover Shooter.

An FTL-like ship (and crew) management + trading game set in that universe would be cool as heck.

That’s a shame because whoever came up with the Mass Effect Space Ship Backstory clearly played a lot of RTS games. The whole Kinetic Shields vs lots of small guns vs a few big guns vs shield-breaking torpedoes, strikecraft/carriers/battleships interaction and the stealth/overheating mechanics they described would make for a fantastic game if properly balanced and implemented.